Copenhagen Consensus: ranked solutions to the world's biggest problems

http://www.copenhagenconsensus.com/Home.aspx

by mmettler • 17 years ago

27 18 17 years ago

1-13 are about treating the symptoms of failed states. How about we treat the disease itself instead? Politics and state building sure are a whole lot more complex and difficult, and don't make you feel nearly as good, as feeding children. But unlike food, and all kinds of other aid, they would actually solve the problem once and for all.

marze• 17 years ago

That sounds like a worthy approach. Any practical ideas on how to actually do it?

One possibility would be to allow a section of a country to secede if 60% of the population votes to do so. That might eliminate a popular reason for war in some situations.

whughes• 17 years ago

Not great for the 10-20% minorities which are supported by the government of the whole country. They'd probably face oppression under a new regime, or themselves begin to rebel.

netsp3• 17 years ago

How would you define section of a country.

roundsquare2• 17 years ago

>One possibility would be to allow a section of a country to secede if 60% of the population votes to do so.

How would you find out? In failed states I would think the mechanisms to solicit opinion don't exist to begin with.

asciilifeform• 17 years ago

> Any practical ideas on how to actually do it?

The (forbidden) answer has been staring everyone in the face for half a century: bring back colonialism.

http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2009/08/from-cr...

barry-cotter• 17 years ago

We know how to solve failed states, it's not politically possible when the Imperial power isn't willing to trade off popular sovereignty against lives saved. Given the choice between good government and self government people will choose the latter

roundsquare2• 17 years ago

Presumably you'd want to subject this proposal to the same cost-benefit style analysis as these guys do. E.g. how many lives would you save per dollar?

This boils down to a long term vs short term question. State building might save a huge number of kids 5 years from now but no kids now unlike giving food.

The problem with a ranking is that it suggests a sequence of actions, when in reality you want to do more than one thing at a time (state building and giving food).

Tichy• 17 years ago

It's not a consensus.

mixmax• 17 years ago

No it's politics. That's why it's called a consensus :-)

JacobAldridge2• 17 years ago

The linked page doesn't really explain the purpose or methodology for arriving at the list. Put simply, "top economists" were asked where the world would get maximum bang for its buck, and this is the list they arrived at.

Yes, there are some source issues that might solve a number of the problems (as asdlfj2sd33 noted earlier). But sometimes it's quicker to deal with symptoms first, and when millions of lives are on the line I'm happy with that kind of shortcut.

That Global Warming ranks so low warrants attention. What sacrifices are we in the developed world causing by focusing on Global Warming and overlooking the other issues?

matstc• 17 years ago

More on global warming ranking low: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/bjorn_lomborg_sets_global_...

catzaa• 17 years ago

> That Global Warming ranks so low warrants attention. What sacrifices are we in the developed world causing by focusing on Global Warming and overlooking the other issues?

If you look at the numbers, global warming are not nearly one of the biggest challenges.

JacobAldridge2• 17 years ago

Exactly, and yet governments like mine (Australia) are pushing it as a global agenda item, while ignoring (or underspending on) possible support for other issues which the numbers show are bigger / better value challenges.

netsp3• 17 years ago

I think that this is more of a result of the way this particular study was structured then anything else. The study doesn't rank challenges, it ranks solutions.

netsp3• 17 years ago

Most of the criticism (I think) revolves around the methodology being biased towards unambitious projects. The economists were asked to rank proposals according to how much good they would do in alleviating existing world problems. The premise is a limited budget roughly based on 'aid budgets'.

I think climate change should have been left outside of what they were looking at altogether for lots of reasons.

The projects are too uncertain to be ranked. Putting an extra $1b towards existing climate change projects may result in absolutely no effect on climate change. We are talking about risky, expensive projects. An economist doesn't really know if a propaganda campaign to convince americans or Chinese to sign some deal is better then some geo-engineering technology project to directly cool the earth. It is outside the realm of what smart economists are good at.

- It is coming out of different pockets. Climate change affects rich countries too. It is self interested spending. Certainly, there are tragedy of the commons like problems. But it is still in the interest of those spending to spend.

- The effects of climate change are uncertain and indirect. One of the potential climate change issues is decreased glacial melt in India resulting in less summer river flows in to Pakistan. India is entitled (by treaty) to a fixed (in litres) amount of water. Pakistan needs this water to grow food without which it will be in famine. This could result in, mass refuge crisis, nuclear war, etc. It is virtually impossible to link something like that directly to an increase or decrease of $500m in spending by some NGO.

*But... If you are a millionaire or in charge of an NGO or a foreign spending budget or give money to a poverty related charity, the Copenhagen Consensus seems like an important list to consider. If decide to act against its recommendations, at least have a reason.

davepeck• 17 years ago

The Gates Foundation pays close attention to this consensus when it is released. Expect Gates' priorities to align well with this list.

The methodology is complex, but the concept isn't: for each issue, how many lives can we save per dollar spent? Rank those higher.

eru• 17 years ago

I take it they also discount the future somewhat?

Copenhagen Consensus: ranked solutions to the world's biggest problems

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